Printing devices include printing presses which print from an ink surface such as type, plates, wood blocks, etc. operating by pressure, either against a flat bed as in a platen press or against a series of revolving cylinders as in a rotary press. Usually these type of devices involve a great amount of typesetting and preparation in order to produce printed material. The intermediate step of typesetting such as preparing a platen or cylinder necessarily slows down the process and increases the expense. Recent improvements have evolved what is referred to as instant printing. The instant printing press still requires a certain amount of typesetting and utilizing rotating cylinders, however.
Recent developments in electronics have also permitted electronically operated typewriters in which text is stored in an electronic memory and then automatically printed on command. These devices utilize dot matrix printers or daisy wheel printers in which the text is printed out one letter at a time. While this particular type of printing process increases the production over single hand typed documents it is not generally efficient enough for mass producing a number of documents.
It would be advantageous if the electronics of the computer type devices could be utilized to operate a printing head suitable for mass production of documents, letters, etc.